The risky business of a foreign correspondent

Nightmares of abduction and confinement disrupted my sleep the night before I left for Afghanistan. It was Dec. 1, 1991, and I was working on a freelance piece for The Los Angeles Times Magazine, flying into Kabul from Uzbekistan on a Soviet military transport on my birthday. My best friends were foreign corresponding colleagues and together we made a pact over shots of vodka that if anything happened to us in the field, we would immediately mobilize media and the U.S. government to aid and rescue us. (Read more)

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Students and supporters hold a candlelight vigil Wednesday at the University of Central Florida in Orlando, to honor Steven Sotloff, the second American journalist to be beheaded by the Islamic State group in two weeks. Sotloff attended the University of Central Florida between 2002 and 2004.